AMD’s Financial Analyst Day last week contained very little information about the company’s plans for its workstation graphics division, but Sunnyvale remains committed to professional graphics. That was the emphatic message from the FirePro personnel we spoke to about this launch; we’ll have a review of the card up in the not-too-distant future. The V3900 replaces the V3800 and is the entry-level counterpart to the V5900 and V7900 we reviewed earlier this year.

Compared to its predecessor, the V3900 is a major upgrade. It sports double the RAM (1GB), uses the Turks GPU derived from AMD’s 6800-series, doubles the available memory bandwidth (to 28.8GB, up from 14.4),and supports the latest versions of OpenGL and OpenCL (4.2 and 1.1 respectively). Raw compute performance as measured in single-precision GFlops is also 20 percent higher, at 624 GFlops. The MSRP of $119 is a tad higher than the $99 tag on the V3800, but the V3900’s additional performance should more than justify the higher price tag.

AMD claims that the V3900 outperforms both the Quadro 400 and the V3800 in a wide range of tests. The hardware specs on the cards make this likely–the Quadro 400 and the V3800 are well matched as far as RAM loadout and memory bandwidth–but we’ll be following up with our own benchmarks as well.

Cutting into Nvidia’s Turf:

Nvidia has dominated professional graphics for years; the company currently holds ~80% of the professional market. When we asked AMD about this disparity, the company confirmed that they were fighting to gain share but noted that the current 80/20 split is a marked improvement over the 90/10 break of 3-4 years ago. Thus far, AMD’s push into the workstation space has been centered around aggressive MSRPs and providing features Nvidia has yet to match. Eyefinity is one of the best examples.

None of Nvidia’s entry or midrange cards support more than two displays; the company’s cheapest triple-display options debut around the $400 mark. AMD, in contrast, bills the V3900 as capable of driving up to five displays. Granted, there’s a significant caveat–you’ll need DP 1.2 support and a separate hub–but if you need to drive that many screens off a single low-end card, it’s possible to do so.

The V3900 will also ship with a half-height bracket to ensure it fits into small form factor systems and is expected to debut in systems from HP with ISV certification from Fujitsu-Siemens following in the spring.

Source:http://hothardware.com/News/AMD-Launches-New-EntryLevel-FirePro-V3900/

Acer said that it had initiated legal action against former CEO and President Gianfranco Lanci. The company claims that Lanci has breached the non-compete clause in his contract when he left the company in March 2011. Acer has initiated legal action in Italian courts, the company said.

Lanci stepped down from his position at Acer last year over disagreements around product strategy. After joining the company in 1997, he helped Acer expand its global presence, presiding over the acquisitions of both Packard Bell and Gateway. Thanks to his leadership, Acer at one point became the second biggest PC company in the world.

But as consumers began to shift to smartphones and tablets, the split between Lanci and Acer investors began to grow: Lanci wanted to push the company to become more mobile-focused and more global. Acer also needed to focus on software and hardware integration by expanding from 300 to 400 engineers to 1,000. This meant hiring talent that currently wasn’t present in Taiwan.

But investors feared that this move would lead to a “de-Taiwanization” of the company. Lanci argued that it’s just globalization. “If we want to be in the top three (PC makers) in the next three to five years, we need to be a global company and we need to leverage resources wherever they are,” he said in an interview at the time.

The bickering between Lanci and the investors continued. Meanwhile, Acer was late in delivering on its smartphone and tablet vision. It misjudged the weakness in demand for products in Europe and the United States, thus leading to two consecutive quarters of missing earnings guidance. It also brought a $150M write down for excess (unsold) inventory in Europe.

Yet had Acer followed his vision, Lanci said the $20 billion business would have quickly grown to a $30 billion business, bringing in over a third of its sales from smartphones and tablets by 2015. “People after a few years will decide who was wrong,” he said.

Seven months after leaving Acer, Lanci signed on with Lenovo as a consultant focusing on assisting the computer firm to build itself as a consumer brand. Shortly thereafter, he was appointed the head of Lenovo’s Europe, Middle East and Africa businesses last month.

“Gianfranco brings years of expertise and insights to Lenovo that will help us strengthen our growing global consumer business,” Lenovo CEO Yuanqing Yang said of Lanci’s new role last year. But apparently Lanci wasn’t allowed to share that expertise and insight with Lenovo, as Acer states that there is a 12-month non-compete period in Lanci’s agreement.

“We believe Mr. Lanci has clearly breached the terms of the non-compete agreement he entered into willingly,” the company states. “We believe we have a very robust case.”

Source:http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Acer-non-compete-Gianfranco-Lanci-Lenovo-Lawsuit,14647.html

A computer made entirely of biological molecules — named a “biological computer” — has been developed by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute in California and the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology.

The biological computer can decrypt images encrypted on DNA chips, the first time this use has been demonstrated, according to the scientists. The group, led by Professor Ehud Keinan of Scripps, used the computer to decrypt logos of The Scripps Research Institute and Technion.

The study was published in a recent online-before-print edition of the journal Angewandte Chemie.

The computer doesn’t look like any computer people would recognize: It’s a combination of DNA molecules and other chemicals in solution in a tube. The molecules carry out all the traditional functions of a computer, with the chemical reactions performing the computing that usually is performed on transistors on a microchip.

The energy source is also biological: the molecule ATP, which powers metabolism.

DNA computers won’t replace traditional electronic computers, which are faster and more accurate. However, biological computers excel at handling extremely large quantities of information, such as that embedded in images. Also, DNA computers can perform certain calculations in parallel, speeding up the process.

———————————————–

Here is more from the Scripps press release:

In explaining the work’s union of the often-disparate fields of biology and computer science, Keinan notes that a computer is, by definition, a machine made of four components-hardware, software, input and output. Traditional computers have always been electronic, machines in which both input and output are electronic signals. The hardware is a complex composition of metallic and plastic components, wires, and transistors, and the software is a sequence of instructions given to the machine in the form of electronic signals.

“In contrast to electronic computers, there are computing machines in which all four components are nothing but molecules,” Keinan said. “For example, all biological systems and even entire living organisms are such computers. Every one of us is a biomolecular computer, a machine in which all four components are molecules that ‘talk’ to one another logically.”

The hardware and software in these devices, Keinan notes, are complex biological molecules that activate one another to carry out some predetermined chemical work. The input is a molecule that undergoes specific, predetermined changes, following a specific set of rules (software), and the output of this chemical computation process is another well-defined molecule.

“Building” a Biological Computer

When asked what a biological computer looks like, Keinan laughs.

“Well,” he said, “it’s not exactly photogenic.” This computer is “built” by combining chemical components into a solution in a tube. Various small DNA molecules are mixed in solution with selected DNA enzymes and ATP. The latter is used as the energy source of the device.

“It’s a clear solution-you don’t really see anything,” Keinan said. “The molecules start interacting upon one another, and we step back and watch what happens.” And by tinkering with the type of DNA and enzymes in the mix, scientists can fine-tune the process to a desired result.

“Our biological computing device is based on the 75-year-old design by the English mathematician, cryptanalyst, and computer scientist Alan Turing,” Keinan said. “He was highly influential in the development of computer science, providing a formalization of the concepts of algorithm and computation, and he played a significant role in the creation of the modern computer.”

“Turing showed convincingly that using this model you can do all the calculations in the world. The input of the Turing machine is a long tape containing a series of symbols and letters, which is reminiscent of a DNA string. A reading head runs from one letter to another, and on each station it does four actions: 1) reading the letter; 2) replacing that letter with another letter; 3) changing its internal state; and 4) moving to next position. A table of instructions, known as the transitional rules, or software, dictates these actions. Our device is based on the model of a finite state automaton, which is a simplified version of the Turing machine. ”

Unique Biological Properties

Now that he has shown the viability of a biological computer, does Keinan hope that this model will compete with its electronic counterpart?

“The ever-increasing interest in biomolecular computing devices has not arisen from the hope that such machines could ever compete with electronic computers, which offer greater speed, fidelity, and power in traditional computing tasks,” Keinan said. “The main advantages of biomolecular computing devices over electronic computers have to do with other properties.”

As shown in this work, he continues, a wealth of information can be stored and encrypted in DNA molecules. Although each computing step is slower than the flow of electrons in an electronic computer, the fact that trillions of such chemical steps are done in parallel makes the entire computing process fast. “Considering the fact that current microarray technology allows for printing millions of pixels on a single chip, the numbers of possible images that can be encrypted on such chips is astronomically large,” he said.

“Also, as shown in our previous work and other projects carried out in our lab, these devices can interact directly with biological systems and even with living organisms,” Keinan explained. “No interface is required since all components of molecular computers, including hardware, software, input, and output, are molecules that interact in solution along a cascade of programmable chemical events.” He adds that because of DNA’s ability to store information, major computer companies have been extremely interested in the development of DNA-based computing systems.

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation, the Israel-US Binational Science Foundation, and the Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology, as well as graduate fellowships from the Irwin and Joan Jacobs Foundation, the Fine Foundation, the Russell Berrie Nanotechnology Institute, and the Israel Ministry of Science and Technology.

Below are the three companies in the Computer Hardware industry with the highest free cash flow per share. FCF/share is a valuable metric signaling a company’s ability to facilitate growth in the business.Apple ranks highest with a FCF per share of $36.00. Following is Hewlett-Packard with a FCF per share of $3.87. Diebold ranks third highest with a FCF per share of $3.26.

Dell follows with a FCF per share of $1.81, and Stratasys rounds out the top five with a FCF per share of $0.69.

SmarTrend recommended that subscribers consider buying shares of Stratasys on October 11th, 2011 as our technology indicated a new Uptrend was in progress when shares hit $23.74. Since that recommendation, shares of Stratasys have risen 70.9%. We continue to monitor Stratasys for any potential shift so investors can protect gains and will alert SmarTrend subscribers immediately.

Source:http://www.equities.com/news/top-financial-story?val=173085156&cat=fin

The folks behind the Raspberry Pi $25 computer say that they could start taking orders by the end of February. This isn’t the first release date we’ve seen — the computers were supposed to be ready to go in December, but that didn’t happen. But not it looks like the first batch of 10,000 should finish production by February 20th.

The Raspberry Pi is a tiny computer motherboard with a Broadcom BCM2835 low-power ARM-based processor. It’s designed to be able to run Linux-based software and it’s targeted at hobbyists, educational institutions, or anyone who really likes the idea of a $25 computer.

If you want internet connectivity, you’ll need to buy a slightly pricier $35 version.

While the system is designed primarily as a low power, low cost PC, it can handle 1080p HD video playback and even some 3D gaming. There’s also a project underway to port the popular media center application XBMC to run on the Raspberry Pi hardware.

Broadcom has also released a datasheet (PDF link) for the BCM2835 chip which may make it easier for independent developers to work with the Raspberry Pi — but the chip still uses closed source drivers, so the datasheet will only get you so far.

Source:http://liliputing.com/2012/02/raspberry-pi-25-computer-could-go-on-sale-this-month.html

The new form factor has been addressed with security as a top priority, along with USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt ports, according to Intel.

Intel has also worked to improve the user experience, making it more seamless by increasing the performance of the solid state drive and calling for the use of more hybrid SSD/hard disk drives.

This will deliver more storage capacity, at the same time giving users a faster over all experience. Intel has built a layer of protection into the hardware that will be needed as the devices go mainstream in the coming years.

Asus has married the world of design and top-end performance on its Zenbook. The Zenbook UX31E has an excellent look with a stunning 13-inch LED backlit display with a pixel resolution of 1600×900. It is powered by an Intel Core i7 processor, boasts 128GB and 256GB SSD hard disk and runs on Windows 7 operating system.

Acer unveiled its Aspire S5 model, supporting the faster data transfer speeds with Thunderbolt, two USB 2.0 ports, a USB port 3.0, HDMI, audio and mic ports, webcam, integrated gigabit LAN and Bluetooth v3.0. Powered by Intel’s Ivy Bridge Processor, it offers 8GB of RAM, runs on Windows 7 operating system and features a 13-inch LED backlit display.

There’s no pricing at the moment, but Acer expects to begin shipping the Aspire S5 in the second quarter of this year.

HP’s Envy Spectre sports a 14-inch Radiance LED backlit display, Intel i5 processor, Intel HD 3000 graphic cards, 4GB of RAM and 128GB of SSD and runs on the Windows 7 OS. The device comes pre-installed with full versions of Adobe Photoshop Elements and Adobe Premiere Elements.

Samsung announced the latest update to its Series 9 laptop at the show, making the stylish machine thinner and promising a whole new batch of hardware. The new Series 9 is less than half an inch thick. High-end aluminium covers the frame, which still manages to expose a few connectivity ports on the side in the name of utility.

The ASUS Zenbook features an ultra slim 13-inch design, SonicMaster audio technology and all-in-one multimedia functions.

The Z330 is the most compact product in LG’s newest Super Ultrabook Series. In terms of performance, LG’s proprietary Super Speed Boot technology enables rapid booting _ roughly three times faster than other 13-inch notebooks in the market. Powered by an Intel Core i7 processor, the Z330 requires less than 10 seconds to complete booting, while it requires a mere 2 seconds to recover from stand-by mode.

The Z330 is equipped with the latest SATA3 Solid State Drive (SSD), which is more than 11 times faster than an ordinary hard drive. The device is light, weighing a mere 1.21kg.

Lenovo is expanding its Ultrabook portfolio with the IdeaPad U310 and U410. Powered by the Intel Core Processor family, these thin and light laptops include Ultrabook versions with 64GB SSD drives for caching data, and versions with up to 500GB HDD storage. Both versions feature ultra-responsive performance with fast boot times and quick resume from sleep. The PCs also features other smart elements including automatically updating the mailbox, instant messaging and social media messages even in sleep mode, with up to 8 hours battery life.

Dell introduced its new XPS 13 Ultrabook _ a 13.3-inch high definition model running on Intel’s second-generation Core i5 or i7 processors. Intel HD 3000 graphics and Intel Rapid Start technology are highlights of the new device, while Intel Smart Connect technology is also included, allowing the XPS 13 to “wake up” periodically to update calendars and email. Battery life is slightly under 9 hours. Dell took strides to ensure the new XPS 13 would appeal to both consumer and corporate markets.

Sony’s Ultrabook concept was protected in a glass case without disclosing any specs.

Sony so far has not launched an Ultrabook. At this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, Sony showcased a concept device but did not disclose any specifications. The concept, however, should feature one of Intel’s Ultrabook guidelines: ultra-low voltage (ULV) Sandy Bridge, or the upcoming Ivy Bridge, processors as well as SSD or hybrid storage.

Both Toshiba and Asus agreed that the Ultrabook segment has acceptably responded to a group of users who require the light and thin form factor with performance.

Last year Toshiba Thailand introduced the Portege Z830 at 39,000 baht. Takon Niyomthai, country manager for IT of Toshiba Thailand, noted that the market feedback has been very promising. Toshiba plans to launch its second model in the segment under its consumer Satellite brand, with a lower price and more mainstream features. The new Satellite will be some 10,000 baht lower than the Portege.

AsusTek Computer managing director Pornthep Watchara-Amnouy noted that the performance of the Ultrabook is not inferior to MacBook Air, in fact some are even better. “Price is not a concern if the device fulfills ones’ needs,” he said, pointing out that there will be more variety of Ultrabook models on the market during the second quarter, while the average price will be around 30,000 baht.

At present, Ultrabooks accounts for less than 1% of the PC market in Thailand and most of the models introduced so far have been high-end and expensive. Starting from the second quarter of this year, many brands are going to launch new series giving consumers a wider variety of choices at competitive prices.

Source:http://www.bangkokpost.com/tech/computer/278625/ultrabooks-refresh-laptop-category

There are some common misconceptions with respect to whether or not it is better to have a custom built computer instead of one manufactured by a major manufacturer. There are some things you should consider when faced with this decision. Some reasons your computer guy may have told you you would be better off with a custom built computer:

True or False: “I (your computer guy) can build a computer cheaper than you can buy one from a major manufacturer!

Really? How many custom built computers does your computer guy build a year? 10? 100? 1000? Is your computer guy suggesting that they have some secret “In” with computer component manufacturers that they can secure these parts at great cost savings? Does it make sense that a computer guy building a few hundred (if that) computers a year can get a better deal on parts than a company like HP or Dell? If that’s true, why are there not more stores just specializing in custom built computers? A good business person needs to make a profit with their business. In order to do so they have to charge more than they pay for the products they sell. To make a reasonable profit they either have to sell a large volume of computers making a few bucks each, or a small number of computers making many more bucks each.

True or False: “It’s better to have a custom built computer because I (your computer guy) know every part that is installed in the machine is the best on the market.”

Be wary of someone suggesting some parts are better than others in the same breath they suggest they can build something cheaper than a major manufacturer can produce. Does it make sense that a guy building computers in Midcoast Maine can get a better deal on high quality parts than a company like Dell or HP? Probably not. Furthermore, if you were in charge of operations at a major manufacturer and you knew you were going to offer a three year warranty on parts for a computer, would you buy low quality parts to install in that machine? Again, probably not. It’s going to cost the company more money to carry through the warranty on those parts. They know this so they make sure all the parts installed in their machines meet their standards. Yes the company is in business to make money, but like most businesses, they probably believe in doing so by providing a great product with great service instead of ripping everyone off every chance they get. And keep in mind… some of these large companies have shareholders to answer to as well. Selling a bad product isn’t going to instill great confidence in the masses.

True or False: “Your computer guy is a genius because he can build a computer from a bunch of parts?”

It doesn’t take a genius to follow directions. With the amount of information available on the Internet, and a bit of patience, anyone with the ability to read and follow directions could build a computer. It may not be the fastest, or the best computer in the world, but a computer nonetheless. Computer hardware is built based on certain standards. That’s part of the reason there are so many manufacturers and it is such a wide spread industry. Everything is standardized to meet certain specs, thereby working with everything else. They are just like automobiles and with enough money, the right tools and enough patience, one could even build an automobile from parts.

Generally, for an estimated 95% of the computer using population a computer built by a major manufacturer is going to be a better value for your money. That doesn’t mean your computer guy is ripping you off, it just means he can’t produce enough volume to lower the cost of the machine to compete with a major manufacturer on an apples to apples basis. Not only can you get a computer from a major manufacturer for a reasonable price, but you typically can get an extended warranty on the hardware for a little extra as well. Does your computer guy offer you an extended warranty?

And don’t think you can’t get what you specifically want with a major manufacturer. Some companies produce thousands of computers all with the same specs and software installed and ship them to department stores and other outlets to be sold to the masses. Others have developed the ability to build a computer specifically for your needs, providing you with options on hardware and software configurations, and still provide it to you at a reasonable price.

When is a good time to get a custom built computer? When you have a special situation, Marine Navigation computers, for instance. Typically these are built using specialized hardware to withstand the environment they will be subjected to. Computers that interact with specific machinery may also require special equipment. If your business has proprietary software that requires certain hardware and that hardware can’t be bought from a major manufacturer. Computer gaming can sometimes benefit from a custom built machine, although usually you can get a comparable machine for a comparable price from a major manufacturer.

Source:http://waldo.villagesoup.com/business/brief/business-services/true-or-false-you-should-buy-a-custom-built-computer-instead-of-one-from-a-major-manufacturer/483223

B&H Photo Video has long been known as a powerhouse in the world of photo and video. Considered by many as the ‘titan’ of the (pro photo, video and audio) industry, B&H caters to a broad range of consumers, from the most discriminating professional photographers, to the simple enthusiast looking for a great deal.

However, what one may not know is that B&H has also garnered an excellent and well deserved reputation as an Authorized computer service provider for companies like Apple, ASUS, HP and Sony.

B&H has an onsite staff of the most experienced IT professionals with A+ Apple certifications, all of whom have extensive background and experience in troubleshooting the most difficult computer problems.

In fact, each and every one of the expert B&H computer consultants has completed hundreds of hours of training and is completely versed in all forms of computer diagnostics (including all hardware and software problems) and other related issues.

Furthermore, the expert staff at B&H will personally guide the customer each and every step of the way, with an unrivaled level of customer support and care. Every customer will be treated as an individual and every computer question and concern will be answered in a detailed and comprehensive manner which is intended to empower and educate.

B&H wants one to understand exactly what the problems are and what they will do to correct and fix your computer issues.

Finally, the B&H prices for all computer diagnostics, service and repair, are extremely competitive in terms of price and value.
Here is a partial list of the many computer services offered by B&H

PC Care – B&H service technicians will install up to two pieces of productivity or anti-virus software for new or used computers. This work includes all associated upgrades to optimize the computer for peak performance.

Data Migration – B&H technicians understand that the customer’s needs are constantly evolving and growing and they are prepared to meet these increased demands by transferring all of the stored personal data (only) and files.

Windows for MAC setup – B&H will partition the hard drive on any Intel-based Mac and install specialized software which will allow one to run the Apple OS or Windows on startup.

Component Installation – B&H service technicians will install and configure all of the hardware components and internal memory and hard drives, to suit one’s specific and individual needs.

System Restoration – B&H service technicians will restore your discs and your computers’ hard drive to its original purchased state.

Diagnostics – When it comes to properly diagnosing a computer problem, nobody does it better than the service technicians at B&H. A proper diagnosis of a computer related issue is the crucial first step in fixing the problem. B&H technicians have the skill and expertise in being able to get to the root of the problem right away.

Diagnostics & Labor – After properly diagnosing the computer related problem, the technicians at B&H have the knowledge and hands on experience to get the customer’s computer up and running in the most efficient and expeditious manner. B&H understands that time is money and is sensitive to the customer’s need for a quick turnaround time on their service order.

Virus & Spyware Removal Have a bug in your system? No problem, B&H service technicians are ready to help with an array of tools to detect, quantify and eradicate all spyware and malware. The computer will be humming along again in no time!

Data Recovery One of the most frustrating and often costly experiences is to lose important and sensitive (personal) data stored on the computer. B&H is intimately familiar with all of the nuances and techniques in properly recovering important data and information. The B&H technicians will ensure that all of your information is recovered and accessible once again.

Corporate Accounts are Welcome B&H makes no distinction between personal and corporate accounts. Whether you have an issue with your home computer or you are a small or large business in need of service on an array of office computers, B&H has the desire to help you out.

In the final analysis it is important to note that the B&H Photo Video business model extends well past their obvious strengths in the world of professional photo and video sales. B&H is also your source for all of your computer servicing and troubleshooting needs.

Source:http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/2/prweb9165782.htm

Since 2006, Vermont has laid out more than $18 million for a Department of Motor Vehicles computer system that barely works.

The system was once touted as a state-of-the art solution. Instead, the state is largely relying on a 40-year system that lacks the ability to provide the immediacy needed in the world of driver records and auto registrations.

State officials said they are working to recoup the costs from the vendor, Hewlett Packard, the fourth company to hold the contract.

“We’ll try to get our money back starting with a settlement conversation, and if that’s not fruitful, the lawyers will take over,” said Rob Ide, state Department of Motor Vehicles commissioner. “We’re looking for a big check.”

“This is outrageous,” said Gov. Peter Shumlin, whose administration inherited the contract when he took office in 2011, but he was a member of the Senate Transportation Committee that oversees motor vehicle matters before becoming governor. “It’s unacceptable.”

Ide and Shumlin attribute the problem to the frequent change in vendors as each one is bought out by another.

Hewlett Packard officials contend the company expects to deliver a successful system

“HP is fully committed to the successful completion of the VT Drives project. The delay is unfortunate; however it is necessary to deliver a high-quality customized system and to implement additional changes as well as functionality that have been requested by the state,” Hewlett Packard spokeswoman Ericka Floyd said. “HP is fully focused on addressing the remaining technical issues, implementing the additional functionality requested and testing the application to bring the project to completion.”

Ide said the state considers the system that has been created to be fatally flawed, though a few of the new functions are working. “We do not believe the code as written will ever work as advertised,” he said.

Whether the state will recover its money or end up with a working computer system remains to be seen. The issue raises questions about the state’s antiquated computer network and its ability to keep pace with technology.

In the meantime, the Department of Motor Vehicles will maintain its old system, Ide said, with the worry that it could give out and leave the state without access to driver and auto registration records.

Though the system functions, Ide said, there are also consequences to its slowness. Recently, he said, a driver received new license plates on a Thursday, went to Montreal for the weekend and upon returning discovered at the border that the registration information hadn’t been updated in the computer.

The state signed a $10 million contract for a new Department of Motor Vehicles computer system in 2006 with Covansys Corp., the low bidder for a system that was dubbed VT DRIVES, or Vermont Driver and Registration Information and Verification Enterprise System.

In the ensuing six years, the state has spent another $8.5 million of staff time, consultants, hardware and software on the system, Ide said. The total comes to $18,553,047, he said, with the state’s last payment to Hewlett Packard in April 2011.

The state has also seen three more companies come through the door.

Covansys’ was bought out in short order and the contract was transferred to Saber Corp. in 2006, said Ellen Hemond of the Department of Motor Vehicles.

Saber was then sold to Electronic Data Systems, which took over the contract in 2007.

EDS was bought out by Hewlett Packard in 2008, and the contract remained with EDS as a division of Hewlett Packard, but then in 2010, Hewlett Packard itself took over the contract, Hemond said.

Bonnie Rutledge, who retired in 2009, was commissioner of motor vehicles when the contract was signed in 2006. She recalled that the state was conscious of not being the lone guinea pig for a new system, and so contracted with a company that was working with other states.

Those states have had some of the same troubles with the vendors.

A 2011 article in the publication GoLocalProv reported, “Rhode Islanders have been paying millions of dollars for a new Department of Motor Vehicles computer system since 2007, but it has yet to even go on-line. ”

Revenue Director Rosemary Booth Gallogly said, “There were continuity issues (with the vendor).”

Finding a computer system that does everything a motor vehicle department needs is a challenge in every state, said Rutledge, who served as board chairwoman with the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. The demands are complex as a wide variety of frequently changing data must be instantly accessible by police, courts, other state agencies and other states.

“I don’t know any state that has put in a completely new system,” Rutledge said.

Rutledge said some pieces of the new system are working. Some DMV transactions can be completed online because of it, she said.

Ide characterized the working portions as “tiny” compared with what is expected.

Vermont’s contract with Hewlett Packard expires Feb. 28, the date by which the state is supposed to have a fully functional, tested system. That won’t happen, Ide said.

“The code is deeply flawed. We have had numerous conversations with HP about this code,” Ide said. “We told them it’s fatal. They act as if it’s not so.”

The state has other contracts with Hewlett Packard, including for the purchase of many of its desktop computers and servers, said Richard Boes, state commissioner of the Department of Information and Innovation.

“Hewlett Packard has been largely a good vendor,” Boes said.

The predicament over the Department of Motor Vehicles system raises questions about the state’s overall computer operations.

Does it make sense for an individual department to go off in search of its own system, or should the state have one big system?

Boes, who joined Vermont state government last year, said it does make sense for the department to have its own system.

The Department of Motor Vehicles’ needs are unique, so it needs a system tailored to those needs. The key is to make sure it also integrates with other state agencies.

“You buy things in pieces,” Boes said. “If you bite off too much, sometimes you bite off more than you can chew.”

Not long after the state signed the contract for the motor vehicle system, it also contracted for a Tax Department computer system. That contract, for $7.8 million with CGI Group Inc. and Oracle, was signed in 2007 and the system went live in 2010, Tax Commissioner Mary Peterson said.

Though the system works, it also has had flaws, Peterson said. There were glitches in recording some collections, but the department was able to work with the vendors and consultants. Notably, the vendors did not change during the process.

Boes said he has advised Ide that if the Department of Motor Vehicles ends up having to pursue a new computer system that it wait until another state has found a successful one.

He said, though, that he still hopes Hewlett Packard will come through on this one.

Shumlin said on a more long-term basis, he wants the state to move to “cloud computing,” where the state no longer houses the servers but contracts out for that to be hosted elsewhere.

“It’s my belief state government should do what the Navy does,” Shumlin said. “Get out of the technology business and contract out to the cloud.”

Rep. Patrick Brennan, R-Colchester, chairman of the House Transportation Committee, which approved the contract and has monitored it since, said he believes changes in personnel with the vendors created a problem the state could not have foreseen.

“There’s no way we could have known those companies would be sold,” Brennan said.

Brennan and Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Richard Mazza, D-Grand Isle/Chittenden, said they would pressure the state to recoup its money, viewing $18 million as a sizable amount.

“We’ve got to continue to pursue this,” Mazza said.

If Vermonters were counting on their elected leaders to watchdog government spending, when it comes to computer systems, legislators bring little to the table. No single House or Senate committee has jurisdiction over computer purchases, and therefore, no committee develops expertise or a sense of the big picture.

“There is no oversight,” said Sen. Vince Illuzzi, R-Essex/Orleans. “It’s been done on an ad hoc basis.”

Sitting at a computer where he was struggling to learn to use Twitter, Illuzzi acknowledged many lawmakers are limited in their computer know-how, more so than with some of the more traditional functions of government.

“You can’t critically judge what you’re being sold,” he said.

Source:http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20120206/NEWS03/202060302/-18-million-computer-system-fails-DMV?odyssey=nav%7Chead

Sony’s New CEO Sees a Tough Road Ahead. As reported earlier this week, Sony’s current Executive Deputy President and Chairman of its Computer Entertainment (SCE) arm, 51-year-old Kazuo Hirai, will serve as President and CEO of Sony Corporation starting April 1. He now admits that taking the reigns of Sony is a much tougher, bigger challenge than when he took the reigns of SCE back in 2006.

“I thought turning around the PlayStation business was going to be the toughest challenge of my career, but I guess not,” he told the Wall Street Journal in an interview. “It’s one issue after another. I feel like ‘Holy s—, now what?’”

He said the company will be in serious trouble if it doesn’t make adjustments, if it doesn’t set aside past successes in manufacturing and focus on the user experience itself. That means shaking up the corporate structure which he blames as the reason behind the lack of product innovation and for keeping with prior tradition. That also means cutting costs like he did with the PlayStation business four years after Sony reported a horrid multi-billion loss.

“Sony cannot continue walking on the same path,” Hirai said on Thursday. “Sony needs to find new business areas, such as medical. We also need to select and narrow our business portfolio.” He added that the key questions for hardware in production at Sony should be “What can you do with the product? What are your services? What kind of content do you have?”

“It’s not just about the hardware product, it’s about the user experience,” he said.

Hirai joined the company back in 1984 by signing on with Sony Music. In 1995, he was assigned to run SCE America (or SCEA) where he played a vital role in the original PlayStation console’s success. Then in 2006 he replaced Ken Kutaragi as SCE President with orders to restore profits after Kutaragi revealed that the PlayStation 3 would lose more than $2 billion in its first year.

One of the changes Hirai plans to make will be the way Sony itself develops products. Previously different business groups mapped out products independently — a method Hirai said lead to a bloated and disjointed portfolio. “We’re going to tell you what you are going to make—not the other way around,” Hirai said. “This is a complete sea change.”

On Thursday Sony said it expects to make a loss of $2.9 billion in the year ending March 31. That’s more than double its previous estimate. Yet Sony shares rose as much as 8.9-percent in Tokyo trading, the biggest daily gain since 2009.

Source:http://www.sananews.net/english/2012/02/sonys-new-ceo-sees-a-tough-road-ahead/

Google first helped us to find stuff and then communicate with its Gmail services. Amazon sold us stuff, first books and then pretty much everything. Facebook let us find out whether our friends were or . Apple sold pretty devices for listening to songs and watching films. Each of these companies was happy doing its own thing and left the others alone.

Now those divisions are breaking down. The big tech firms are on a cybercollision course. Thanks to new hardware, notably tablet computers and smartphones, new software and apps and a world blanketed by wi-fi and 3G (and soon 4G), we work, rest and play online more and more.

We read newspapers on our tablets, listen to music on our iPods or MP3 players, book a restaurant table or a cinema ticket on our smartphones, store our photographs on Flickr and look at our personal and professional email, documents and calendars online.

As the market for digital stuff expands, doing only one thing, however well, is no longer so attractive for tech firms because it’s no longer so lucrative.

What Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Apple’s Tim Cook and Google’s Larry Page want to do is to become the sole caterer to all our burgeoning digital needs.

The more services they can offer, the more users they can attract, the more services they can sell us and the more advertising revenue they can generate. The battle to become chief executive of the web is on.

Zuckerberg’s initial public offering is a key part of his attempt to run the web. Facebook may have more than 800 million users but it is small. Last year it had revenues, largely from selling advertisements, of $US3.7 billion ($3.4bn), as against Google’s $US38bn in 2010. To expand, Zuckerberg needs cash and plenty of it.

In May, after the IPO, he will have a war chest of $US5bn. That will enable him to join his rivals in the fab four as each spends big to try to digitise and revolutionise every corner of our lives, taking a slice out of each transaction that results.

How will they do this? Being successful in Silicon Valley means being good at keeping secrets, but here are some of the products that insiders say each firm has hidden up its hoodie sleeves.

Facebook will offer better social networking and communication. It has copied some of the most lauded features of Google’s new social networking service Google+. It promises a broader, more social email-style system that Facebookers insist will replace what they call “old-fashioned” Gmail.

Facebook is flirting with the idea of taking on Google’s core business with its own search service. Not one based on results in cyberspace, however well sifted by algorithms, but on the data provided by you, me and our friends.

A Facebook phone, with photos and status updates uploaded to a Facebook page with a single click, is on the way.

Facebook is joining movie website Netflix, music streaming service Spotify and games maker Zynga to bring us Facebook TV, Facebook movies, Facebook music and Facebook games based on our own preferences and our friends’ recommendations.

There are even Facebook credits, a virtual currency bought with real money that Facebookers use to play computer games. The goal is to make us live wholly inside Facebook’s walled garden, a place Zuckerberg insists with boyish enthusiasm “is going to be really, really good”.

Sadly for Zuckerberg, he has competition from the neighbours and they have an even bigger stash of cash. Apple, which has $US98bn to spend, almost as much ready cash as the US government, has the most popular smartphone model on the market, the iPhone, and the most popular tablet computer, the iPad.

Cook, who took over Apple after Steve Jobs resigned from the chief executive job not long before his death last year, is determined to make them even better. He has, for example, integrated Twitter throughout Apple’s line-up, enabling us to tweet from any app, a feature clearly aimed at dulling Facebook’s mobile growth.

Cook is also working on iPad, iPod and iTunes services that he believes will trump Facebook’s music, movies, TV and games offerings. He wants to sell us e-books through the iBooks part of iTunes, to lure us away from Amazon. Apple’s new iCloud service enables us to write and store our documents, spreadsheets, email, contacts and calendar on Apple’s servers and access them on any device we want, even ones we do not own, in a direct challenge to Google’s online computing services.

Cook is also readying a web-enabled Apple TV. The idea is that we will buy programs and films using iTunes. Television is the most important mass medium yet to be breached by the digital world.

Just down the road from Facebook, Google’s whizzo brains have stopped lounging on beanbags and crunching granola bars while lecturing the world on the virtues of not being evil and started knuckling down to the gritty business of grinding Zuckerberg’s and Cook’s noses into the techno-dirt.

Google has its own version of the iPhone. It’s not a single phone but any handset that runs its Android software. Android phones comfortably outsell iPhones, accounting for almost half of all smartphones sold worldwide. Google has launched a web-based Google TV service, offering programs streamed via the web. It is using Google+ to make its search results more social, to combat Zuckerberg’s social search ambitions. It has launched Google Music, to offer songs, and it owns YouTube, where we can now watch or rent TV programs and films.

In development in Mountain View, Google’s headquarters, is Google Wallet, an online payment program that will enable us to buy stuff by waving our phone at a shop’s paypad.

Google already makes mobile phones in partnership with HTC and Samsung, and recently it spent $US12.5bn snapping up Motorola’s consumer division. It is readying its first own-label, Motorola-built mobile phones and tablet computers to tackle Apple head-on and is even flirting with becoming a telephone service provider.

“We’re still at the very, very early stages of what technology can do,” Page says.

“Our ultimate ambition is to transform the overall Google experience, making it beautifully simple, almost auto-magical.”

And what of Amazon, that other West Coast behemoth that nearly doubled in size between 2008 and 2010 and hit almost $US50bn in annual revenues last year? It has new hardware, the Kindle Fire, which helpfully comes loaded with the account details of Amazon users, making it easier than ever to buy stuff. The Fire also boasts social networking that connects Amazon users with others who share tastes in books and films, a direct challenge to Facebook.

Amazon offers a new app shop, a new online payment system, TV and movie streaming and cloud computing for individuals and businesses.

As they jostle for position, each of the tech titans is as busy talking down the opposition as it is talking itself up.

Apple has vowed to “destroy” Google’s Android mobile phone and tablet computer operating system, which senior executives dismiss as “theft” of Apple technology. Apple is suing manufacturers of Android devices all over the world for patent infringement.

Google’s response? “Failing to succeed in the smartphone market, they are resorting to legal measures.”

Facebook hired the PR firm Burson-Marsteller to plant negative stories about Google. When it got caught, it said sorry.

This is what happens when an entire industry reboots itself. The great tech war of 2012 marks the start of the third age of computing. In the beginning, firms battled to sell us hardware. It was IBM vs Apple vs whatever beige box we liked the look of. Then hardware became a commodity and firms competed to sell us better software — Microsoft Windows v Apple OS v Google’s online services.

Now, in the mobile internet age, firms are battling to create the best online platform, offering a vast, seamlessly connected suite of anytime, anywhere services that we use all day, every day and that become as much a part of our lives as the air we breathe. Creating the dominant platform matters so much because it will give the winning firm the lion’s share of the world’s eyeballs. More eyeballs means more direct sales of hardware, software and services, and advertising. But eyeballs offer something even more valuable, something tech firms prize more than anything else: data.

Every time you or I log on to Google, Facebook, Amazon or iTunes, we leave digital fingerprints. With our search queries, our “likes”, the songs we listen to, the TV programs we watch, the books we buy and our tweets, we reveal who we are. Thanks to our computer’s IP address and location-based technology in mobile phones, we also disclose where we are.

This accurate, real-life, real-time information is an invaluable treasury. It enables Google and Facebook to offer advertisers the chance to reach their target market and even to advertise to them at particular times of the day and in places where they are most likely to respond. Facebook, whose data is even more valuable because we tell it more about ourselves and it knows who our friends are, is desperate to start using it to ramp up its ad sales to Google-like proportions.

Analysts think the digital advertising sector could be worth $US200bn by 2020.

There’s a problem here, of course. Apart from Apple’s natty hardware and all the big players’ software and apps, critics say the fab four create little or nothing. What they do is make all the money in the world by exploiting other people’s stuff.

Most of the content we find when we do a Google search is created by others, but Google sells ads against the search. The content creators do not receive a share of the ad revenue.

Google points out that its search engine sends users to the content creators’ websites, where each can try to make money itself.

Amazon sells books at prices lower than publishers and booksellers say is fair. Facebook does not create the data it uses to sell advertising. We agree to hand the data over when we sign up and we do not get to opt out.

Apple pays record labels for the music it sells through iTunes but keeps a big chunk of sales revenue for itself: iTunes now in effect runs the music industry.

With an eye to the bottom line, the fab four bitterly resist any attempt to stop them exploiting one another’s content. Each spends billions on lobbying politicians to drive home their case that any regulation of the internet would impinge on free speech and free trade. Who could object to freedom, right?

Well, more and more of us. Newspapers, including this one, have set up paywalls to ensure readers pay for high-quality journalism rather than simply getting it free. Hollywood studios, which are battling piracy, are backing the (now shelved) Stop Online Piracy Act in America, which aims to make internet service providers do more to respect copyright. Facebook is facing a backlash from users over its decision to publish all their posts in a timeline that creates a permanent online diary of its users’ lives for all to see.

In her new book, I Know Who You Are and I Saw What You Did: Social Networks and the Death of Privacy, Lori Andrews, an American law professor, calls for a new constitution governing how web firms can exploit our data and the content generated by traditional businesses.

How do the hi-tech firms respond to critics? They don’t care much, and since they are making more money than god, who can blame them? For now, regulators show little interest in clipping tech firms’ wings. Most consumers seem pretty happy, too.

Polls — and sales — show that our desire for a connected future vastly outweighs any concerns we may have that we will become slaves to the machine.

Ultimately, it is you and I who will decide the victor of the great tech war of 2012. Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple have gone from being the dreams of the young and the obsessions of the stubborn to a place in the dictionary because almost everyone reading this article uses them. Whichever we keep logging on to will keep growing. Whichever we lose interest in won’t.

Source:http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/race-to-win-cyber-world/story-e6frg6z6-1226263165917

Delhi Public School, RK Puram, organised its 16th annual computer symposium, Exun 2011, on November 19 and 20. The event surpassed all expectations, with participation from more than 1,000 students from 50 schools across Delhi and the NCT. Day One started with the lighting of the lamp. The Principal, Dr D R Saini, welcomed all the guests. There was a scintillating performance by the Exun band and the techie intro video was presented. The air was thick with anticipation and excitement as the symposium got off to a good start, and the participants dispersed for their respective events. The first day’s events consisted of a group discussion, creative event, hardware and benchmarking, preliminary round of the senior and junior quiz, crossword and gaming, whereas the second day comprised the final rounds of the senior quiz, junior quiz, crossword, hardware/benchmarking and gaming, as well as programming and Swat the Bug. Each event’s updates and results were made available online on exunclan.com immediately after the completion of each event for the convenience of the participants. While all the events conducted on the school premises saw a high level of talent and enthusiasm, the highlight of Exun 2011 was its four-day-long online event, SudoCrypt. This event was open to international participation. With registrations running into thousands, the event garnered more than two lakh hits on the site from over 30 countries including USA, UK, France and UAE. The first 25 rank holders of SudoCrypt received Expert Sudo International Rank Certificates and the Rank 1 received a HCL ME Pad as special prize. The events at Exun provided a platform to each tech-enthusiast student to test his/her creative, logical and analytical skills. The host school was non-competitive and the Overall Trophy of Exun 2011 was won by DPS Dwarka. The symposium was a great experience for everyone present. It was coordinated by Mukesh Kumar, Head of the Computer Department and his dedicated team of teachers. Exun 2011 more than lived up to expectations, and provided each and every person present there with some great memories.

Spectrum 2012 at Cambridge School, Indirapuram

Students of Cambridge School, Indirapuram, participated in Spectrum 2012 — an inter-school art and craft event held at Cambridge School, Greater Noida, on January 24 and 25. Cambridge School won the Overall Excellence Trophy for the second year in a row. Anwesha Mukherjee and Pari Aggarwal won the first and the third prize respectively in the drawing and colouring competition. Riya won the third prize in pot painting and Tanuja Kumari won the first prize in cartoon making. Gautam Arora and Sona Shubham Vats secured the first position in the PowerPoint Presentation competition. Eight students from Classes IV and V won the second prize in the Dramatisation of Poem Competition, and 10 students of Classes IX and X won the first prize in the Street Play (Hindi).

Republic Day celebrated at Abhinav Public School

Republic Day was celebrated at Abhinav Public School, Pitampura, on January 25 with great pomp. Children sported the colors of our national flag on their cheeks, forehead and screamed Vande Mataram slogans with all their might. The Chief Guest, Ramesh Aggarwal, was greeted by the Manager. A two-hour-long cultural programme, full of nationalist fervor, was presented before the guests. The Chief Guest called upon the students to dedicate their lives to the cause of the nation and nationalism. Presenting various episodes of his personal experience in the Indian Air Force, he exhorted them to perform to the best of their abilities and make the whole country proud. He asked the children to respect the Indian Constitution and go by the prescription laid down by Dr Rajendra Prasad and Dr B R Ambedkar.

Source:http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/school-notes;-dps-rk-puram-organises-16th-computer-symposium/908326/

Cooler Master’s been doing its thing for two decades now, and as part of its ongoing 20th anniversary celebration, the peripheral maker today announced a temporary price reduction for its CM Storm Trooper computer case. Effectively immediately, the CM Storm Trooper will be available for $150 through all of Cooler Master’s U.S. and Canadian channel partners, down a cool $40 from its normal $190 price tag.

“Our team has been searching for several ways to show our customers that we’ve gotten this far by the bond that we’ve forged with them and our partners over the years. It is through this, and other, gestures that we hope to convey that gratitude,” said Bryant Nguyen, Senior Product & Marketing Manager for Cooler Master USA, Inc.

The CM Storm Trooper is a full tower chassis with a mesh front panel and oodles of cooling potential. It has room for eight fans, or nine if you convert the top-mounted 200mm fan spot into two 120mm or 140mm fans. There are 9+1 expansion slots, a boatload of drive bays to work with, a pair of USB 3.0 ports, cable routing cutouts, and a bunch of other features outlined on its product page.

Source:http://hothardware.com/News/Cooler-Master-Nicks-Price-of-CM-Storm-Trooper-to-Celebrate-20th-Anniversary/

MBX Systems, a leading manufacturer of custom-built OEM server appliances for software vendors and service providers, has been named a finalist for the sixth annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service in the “Customer Service Department of the Year—Computer Hardware” category. The company was one of only three finalists in the category, based on the advanced technology services it provides to ensure the smooth operation of MBX-manufactured hardware systems that are deployed in tens of thousands of corporate data centers around the world.

Those services include:

Component lifecycle management to monitor parts reliability and end-of-life schedules before they affect application performance at end user sites;
Optional 24/7/365 remote monitoring of systems in the field to provide predictive failure information on CPUs, power, system temperature or other components;
An unusual no-charge policy on maintaining inventory and cross-shipping replacement units for situations where replacement components cannot be swapped in the field.
A password-protected online portal that alerts customers to component issues while also providing real-time data on order history, current order status, appliance specifications, inventory, shipments, pricing and RMAs.

These support services play a key role in driving a 98% customer retention rate and a 96% customer satisfaction rating for MBX. The company’s made-to-order server appliances enable software applications and services to be pre-loaded on optimized hardware systems for turnkey deployment.

Stevie Awards finalists were selected from more than 1,000 entries from around the world in a variety of categories, including 27 focusing on customer service such as Contact Center of the Year, Innovation in Customer Service, and Customer Service Department of the Year. Seven specialized judging committees comprised of more than 100 professionals will determine the Gold, Silver and Bronze award designees. Winners will be announced February 27.

“Our job doesn’t end when we ship a finished hardware system. If any hardware component fails, despite the fact that we use Tier 1 hardware suppliers and test every system multiple times before deployment, business-critical functions like data archiving, network security, content management or cloud storage can be crippled. That would reflect poorly on the customers for whom we build appliances,” said Tom Crowley, MBX founder and CEO. “We developed our customer service strategies to protect our customers’ reputation as well as to enable their customers to have uninterrupted service from their hardware appliances.”

Crowley himself was named Executive of the Year/Computer Hardware in the Stevie Awards’ 2011 American Business Awards. He earned the honor for spearheading MBX’s entry into the server appliance market and for driving 16 years of consecutive growth, even in a recessionary economy.

Source:http://www.sacbee.com/2012/02/02/4233931/mbx-systems-named-finalist-for.html

RadiSys Corporation is the first best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 100% of the 4 brokerage analysts covering it. Apple Inc. is the second best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 91% of the 55 brokerage analysts covering it. Cardtronics, Inc. is the third best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 90% of the 10 brokerage analysts covering it. EMC Corporation is the fourth best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 89% of the 36 brokerage analysts covering it. Digi International Inc. is the fifth best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 83% of the 6 brokerage analysts covering it.

SYNNEX Corporation is the sixth best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 80% of the 10 brokerage analysts covering it. SanDisk Corporation is the seventh best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 78% of the 23 brokerage analysts covering it. Intevac, Inc. is the eighth best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 75% of the 4 brokerage analysts covering it. Mercury Computer Systems Inc. is the ninth best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 71% of the 7 brokerage analysts covering it. Quantum Corporation is the 10th best-rated stock in this segment of the market. It is rated positively by 71% of the 7 brokerage analysts covering it.

Source:http://www.cnanalyst.com/2012/02/top-10-best-rated-computer-hardware-stocks-rsys-aapl-catm-emc-dgii-snx-sndk-ivac-mrcy-qtm-feb-02-201.html

This week Microsoft released its Kinect controller for the Windows PC, a move that will unleash non-touch gesture control to the masses.

Already a great commercial success for Xbox entertainment console, this release of Kinect and the corresponding software development kit (SDK) will enable new ways of interacting with the humble desktop PC.

The Kinect isn’t the first gesture system but it will go down as the commercial break through that put it into hands and minds of the mass market and set the expectation for the competition.

The Kinect comes from the slow burning field of Computer Vision (CV). Computer vision is a tough problem to crack and has always been burdened by expensive hardware requirements which usually put it out of the reach of the average hobbyist. Faster processors, webcams and the commoditisation of video equipment has created a fertile environment for CV researchers and we are now seeing the fruits of their labour.

Recent visits with University of Wollongong, RMIT and QUT researchers to talk about their work in computer vision left me with the feeling that the CV community is going to be coming into its own this decade. Some of the demonstrations I saw were the stuff of science fiction and must surely mean flying cars are just around the corner!

Traditionally, CV research has been sponsored by intelligence and surveillance agencies as well as manufacturing industries (especially in robotics). Crowd monitoring and aberrant behavior detection (e.g. driving the wrong way) featured heavily in the demonstrations.

One of the most fascinating uses I saw was gait detection which tried to determine if someone was carrying concealed weapons, injured or had been bound as a hostage. Emergency services and law enforcement can combine these techniques with infrared video and portable computing to effectively plan responses by seeing through the wall. The ability for this technology to be abused was ever present in the back of my mind – some of the prototypes were quite eerie.

The presence of CV is underpinning much product differentiation and not just in the games console market. Car TV ads are showing off their new parking and collision sensors, many of which currently don’t necessarily use CV but will continue to develop until it is undoubtedly the norm. Self driving cars will rely heavily on computer vision.

Google’s Icecream Sandwich Android release features facial recognition as an screen unlock feature. Most modern digital cameras have face detection, eye tracking kits for user experience practitioners and even high-end children’s toys are starting to sport forms of CV.

These must be very satisfying times for the computer vision research centers. CV is no longer in the realm of “gimmick” technology.

Back to Kinect. Kinect devices have had 3rd party unofficial libraries built for them for a while now, but an official SDK will legitimise products and services, as well as further enable the home CV hacker to develop new and powerful more natural ways of interacting with computer systems.

The area I feel has the most to gain from availability of Kinect on PC is health care, particularly for people with disabilities that make using a mouse and keyboard difficult. Gesture-controlled systems could radically improve access to online services, education and communication for people who are unable to make fine motor movements or have intellectual disabilities that make learning to use unintuitive input devices (keyboard and mouse) a hurdle.

Physiotherapy, rehabilitation and behavioural therapists could also develop a new raft of tools for their clients which could target muscle groups and behaviours in a game world to make treatment more enjoyable and therefore more effective.

Improvements in material science, speech recognition, touch computing and computer vision are creating a fascinating nexus for innovation and will fundamentally change the way in which we view human/computer interaction which will be more natural and hopefully much more inclusive.

How long does the humble keyboard and mouse have left?

Source:http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/innovation/blogs/smoke–mirrors/the-computer-eyes-have-it-20120202-1quj8.html

Developing computer games is risky business. More so, if you’re creating a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Game (MMORPG), which requires a massive investment in capital and time.
But that is the risk Singapore-based Time Voyager‘s founder and CEO Chris Loo is willing to take. By developing their first title — Chaos Gate – for the fast-growing China market, they could potentially reap big rewards. Last year, a report revealed that sales from the China games market reached US$7B last year, a 32.4 percent year-on-year increase.
Time Voyager’s risk-taking spirit is something Canon’s Think Big campaign aims to promote. Think Big encourages entrepreneurs to not just earn a profit, but also to expand their business horizons by doing what was thought to be impossible.
For Chris, this meant venturing beyond local shores to develop a full-fledged MMORPG game from scratch, a category that is dominated by established game developers from the US, Japan, South Korea, and China.
He is certainly no wide-eyed neophyte, and has no illusions about the challenges of the gaming industry. Even big name game studios flounder from time to time.
“The survival rate for MMORPG games under development is very low. According to my opinion of the market, three out of four developments will fail before closed beta, and another 50 percent of the remaining commercialized MMORPGs will have mediocre results. It’s a high-risk endeavor,” he said.
But with the right approach, he believes Chaos Gate, which will be free to play, can do well in the China market when it launches there in April.
Already, it’s off to a promising start. Kingsoft, a top ten games publisher in China, has picked up the title. They will handle the game’s marketing push in the country.
What sets Chaos Gate apart from other MMORPGs is that it caters to casual, intermediate, and hardcore players at the same time by adopting the best features from games that target the various market segments.
Casual games that find it hard to play the game with both the keyboard and the mouse — a standard configuration in 3D games — can navigate around using just the mouse. If they want to complete a quest, they can set their avatar to ‘autorun’ to the quest location.
Hardware requirements are also quite lenient — a gamer doesn’t really need the latest rig or state-of-the-art internet connection to run Chaos Gate smoothly. This is a crucial step to ensure widespread adoption of the game in China, since high-end machines and lightning-fast internet connections are out-of-reach to the average consumer.

Hardcore gamers who like more of a challenge can revert back to the keyboard and mouse combo, complete high-level quests that require teamwork between players, and collect armor that have cool special effects when worn as a set. The armor pieces can also be progressively upgraded.
The game also has social media elements embedded in it. Players can easily share about their achievements and conquests on platforms like Facebook.
What’s important in any RPG title is the story, and Chaos Gate seems to have an interesting premise: In the not-too-distant future, aliens have invaded earth, and the only way to save it is to travel back in time to retrieve special stones that can help save the planet.
These unique features underscore Time Voyager’s desire to set itself apart from the competition. The ability to innovate and redefine an industry is another trait Canon Think Big aims to encourage in Singaporean entrepreneurs.

Chris Loo, founder and CEO of Time Voyager.
With the game on the cusp of commercialization, it’s easy to forget that Time Voyager’s three-year, well, voyage from idea to product was not exactly a walk in the park.
Hiring and keeping top talent in China was a challenge. While the company now has about 40 staff in China which mainly handles art and content creation, the most crucial step was hiring the first guy.
“In China, staff need a strong leader to make decisions and resolve disagreements. Once you hire good top people that are renowned in the industry, the rest will follow,” Chris said.
He added that hiring talent people starts with a long process of courtship and relationship building.
“The work environment is very family-based. Potential employees want to know that you can be trusted.”
Interestingly, Time Voyager’s ability to retain talent was a factor in Kingsoft’s decision to pick up Chaos Gate. In the Chinese gaming industry, company loyalty is hard to come by. A lot of game developers are ambitious and want to be ahead of the pack.
This is even more pronounced if they have peers who are doing exceptionally well in hot-selling game titles.
Therefore, in such a competitive environment, the rate of poaching is very high.
“Kingsoft likes game studios who have the ability to keep people,” he said. “They adopted a wait-and-see attitude at first, visited our studio every month and monitored our progress.”
“But eventually, they were quite happy with what we’re doing.”
There are differences between the Chinese and US gaming markets too.
In China, for example, gamers tend to be a little bit more impatient. They want their characters to be well-dressed at the beginning, otherwise they’ll be turned off. They also want to reap rewards more quickly. US gamers, on the other hand, prefer a more gradual approach, and have a greater need to feel some sense of achievement.
There’s also a difference in the approach towards marketing games. In China, Internet cafes are popular, and many young people flock to these places. As a result, publishers need to incentivize these cafes to install their games, and hope that players are hooked on it.
In more developed countries, however, gamers usually have their own computers at home. The marketing methods needed to reach these gamers changes drastically.
By understanding the market deeply, working hard to retain good staff, and creating a differentiated product, Time Voyager hopes to create the next big thing in the Chinese gaming market.
Time will tell if they can achieve their aims.
But whatever happens, Chris is right up there with the other entrepreneurs promoted by Canon Think Big — flying the Singapore flag abroad and doing the country proud with their vision and boldness.

Source:http://sgentrepreneurs.com/singapore-entrepreneurs/2012/02/02/singapore-computer-games-company-time-voyager-is-betting-big-on-china/

Now that the holidays and CES craziness are over, we thought it would be a good time to launch our latest giveaway! This time around, we’ve teamed up with our friends at Gigabyte to give away a few of pieces of HOT hardware. Up for grabs, we have a Z68 series, Z68XP-UD3P motherboard, GeForce GTX 560 N56GOC-IGI graphics card, and a Force K3 keyboard and M6900 mouse

To be entered into this sweepstakes, please follow these quick and easy guidelines below. If you’re brand new here, there might be a few more steps necessary, but otherwise it’s pretty simple!

1) – First: Make sure you’re a registered member at HotHardware.com. You can also login with your Facebook or Twitter accounts if you’d like.

2) – Be active in news and article discussions and the forum community here at HotHardware.com. Your posts are your entries! (Only quality posts will count. No Spam please.)

3) – “Like” the Gigabyte and HotHardware Facebook pages if you haven’t already done so.

4) – That’s it!

The contest will run through February 3, 2011, at which point we’ll pick and announce the lucky winners. Get in early and post here, in the HH news discussions and in our forum often!

Source:http://hothardware.com/News/HotHardware-and-Gigabyte-New-Years-Giveaway/

New forms of digital technology and social networking sites such as Facebook are increasingly putting people at risk of stalking, according to a report published on Wednesday.

The study, from Women’s Aid and the Network for Surviving Stalking, warns that mobile phones, particularly smartphones, are increasingly being targeted. Spyware could be installed on the phone in “less than five minutes”, allowing a stalker to listen remotely to the phone’s surroundings, intercept calls, track text messages and the location of a device if it has GPS hardware.

Computer spyware could be installed remotely, via an email attachment, and then remain hidden on the computer, warned the report. “It’s cheap, easy to use and very powerful,” it said.

Other methods of tracking can be more simple. One woman detailed in the report failed to change her eBay password after separating from an abusive partner. He tracked her use of the site online and when she bought something he contacted the seller claiming the item had not arrived and asking the seller to verify the address. Armed with his ex-partner’s new address, he found her and targeted her in an attack that left her blind in one eye.

“Online stalking is definitely happening more often because there is such an array of powerful tools at stalkers’ disposal making it easier to do,” said Jennifer Perry, author of Digital Stalking: A Guide to Technology Risks for Victims. Technology firms and social networking sites needed to do “much more” to protect potential victims, she added. “Software companies are absolutely not doing enough to mitigate this risk. The only way we will change things is by making the public aware of the dangers.”

Alexis Bowater, chief executive of the Network for Surviving Stalking, who was followed online for four years before her stalker was jailed, said the rapid rise of mobile phone and internet use meant cyberstalking was on the increase. “It is an old crime in a new, technological world,” she said.

“The internet gives stalkers a new weapon in their armoury, a new way to find people, to follow them, to research them, sometimes to be them.”

The extent of internet users’ “digital footprint” – their use of social networks, work websites, forums and directories, could all leave clues that could enable a stalker to track their victim.

Social networks are particularly risky, according to the report. “You can never make social networks ’safe’ for victims to use, you can only make them ’safer’,” it said. “Their commercial success depends upon encouraging users to exchange information with the widest network possible, which compromises the privacy and security of their users. Indeed, you could argue that it is in their interest not to encourage good privacy practices.”

Perry, an internet safety expert and consumer advocate, said the advice Facebook provided to victims of domestic violence was “wholly inadequate and was putting victims at risk”. She called on the site to change their abuse and help pages and provide a privacy setting specifically for vulnerable people. “The problem is social networking sites like Facebook make money the more data people expose. For the majority of people that does not put them at risk, but in the case of domestic violence or stalking victims it can be very dangerous.”

She added that new features, such as a location button that let users inform their friends on Facebook of their exact whereabouts, were often presented entirely positively, with not enough emphasis given to the risks involved.

A spokeswoman for Facebook said choosing to share a location was always “entirely optional” and that privacy setting enabled users to share what they wanted and block unwanted attention. Users could report abuse via links on the site or through the contact forms in its help centre. She added that the site had “systems to prioritise” the most serious reports and acted on most within 24 hours. “The safety of our users is our top priority. Facebook works with a diverse set of experts and organisations devoted to online safety in order to bring the best safety resources, including the National Network to End Domestic Violence, who also sit on our safety advisory board,” she said.Perry said she advised stalking victims to assume their computer had been infected. “It is safer to assume that everything you do or say online, all your emails, contacts photos and instant messages as well as passwords and contacts can be seen,” she said. Stalkers could use this information to lock victims out of their accounts, buy goods or transfer money, go online and pretend to be the victim, add or delete files and block websites so victims were unable to access support sites.

Bowater called for more awareness of the dangers of new technology. “We are calling for better police training on all types of stalking and particularly digital stalking. We are asking the internet industry to engage with us to make their customers’ lives safer.

Source:http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/feb/01/social-media-smartphones-stalking

Are you fed up with Microsoft Windows and ready to give Linux a try? Here’s how to get started. This guide for Linux discusses who the Linux OS is right for, what you need to get started, and how to turn your Windows PC into a dual-boot computer so you can have the best of both worlds – Linux and Windows.

Why try Linux?
Linux will never be as popular a desktop operating system as Microsoft Windows or Mac OS X, but there are some good reasons to give Linux a try.

For starters, you can download and install Linux for free. Applications that run on Linux machines tend to be free as well, and they include PC essentials such as office productivity suites, image editing software, and video editing tools. Though Linux is not immune to viruses, malware is rarely a concern in the Linux world, especially for home users. And because Linux is less of a PC resource hog than Windows and the Mac OS, it’s ideal for use with a laptop, a netbook, or an older desktop.

Finally, as Web services and HTML5-based apps play an increasingly dominant role in our computing lives–from music services such as Pandora to Yahoo Mail to Google Docs to Bing Maps to countless games–the operating system begins to play second fiddle to the Web. Linux is a dirt-cheap alternative to dropping $500 on PC that can run Windows 7.

Who should use Linux?
Linux can be a good choice for anyone, but two types of users are likely benefit most from Linux: power users and nontechnical users.

Power users will enjoy Linux, because it’s a flexible, highly customisable OS that they can adapt to suit their needs in such areas as the look of the desktop or the ability to prevent any extra software from adding bloat to the system.

Linux is also great for nontechnical users who just want a computer that’s easy to use, has many applications available for download, and doesn’t require a lot of maintenance. Thanks to Linux distributions such as Ubuntu that are easy to install and use, Linux is no longer “difficult to use.”

What is Linux?
Linux is a Unix-like open-source operating system that uses the Linux kernel as its base and comes packaged with basic software, including a lot of components from the GNU (pronounced Guh-new) project.

There is some debate among Linux users about whether it’s correct to call the open-source operating system Linux or GNU/Linux to reflect the fact that Linux distributions are loaded with software from the GNU Project. GNU is another Unix-like operating system, but one that lacks a usable kernel. Typical pieces of GNU that you’re likely to come across in Linux include the Bash shell and assorted command-line utilities, GNU Emacs, Gnu Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), GNOME, and GNASH (a Flash player replacement).

Know your components
Three main elements of a Linux operating system come up often in discussions of Linux: the distribution, the desktop environment, and the Linux kernel. These components, along with software from GNU, constitute the basic parts of your Linux distribution.

Distribution

The all-important decision in the Linux world involves figuring out which version (called a distribution or distro) you want to use. Options include popular distributions such as Ubuntu and Linux Mint that are relatively easy to install, as well as more-complex and customizable distros such as Arch Linux. To figure out what each distribution looks like and what it offers, consult the website DistroWatch, which offers screenshots, download links, and reviews for more than 300 Linux distros. According to DistroWatch, the five most popular Linux versions at this writing are Linux Mint, Ubuntu, Fedora, OpenSUSE, and Debian.

Take some time to poke around DistroWatch and read the descriptions of various Linux distributions to see what each offers, what they look like in a default configuration, and what others think of the OS. Linux newbies will probably do best with Ubuntu or Mint, as these distributions are easy to install and offer the fewest problems for first-time users.

You should also be aware that many distributions in the Linux world are built using other distributions as a base. Mint, for example, is based on Ubuntu, which is a variant of Debian.

To see whether any known problems exist for running Linux with your PC model, check out the user forums for your distribution. Though this usually isn’t an issue, it does come up from time to time, just as it does with Windows.

If you’re buying a new computer, check to see which hardware runs best with the distribution you want to use. Ubuntu, for example, has a certified hardware page that details which desktops, laptops, and notebooks are known to work well with Ubuntu.

The desktop environment

Your desktop environment is your system’s user interface. It determines how windows and icons are styled and how you navigate through your system. Among the many different desktops available in the Linux world are Gnome, KDE, Xfce, and LXDE. Ubuntu maker Canonical released a new desktop interface in April 2011 called Unity, which is based on Gnome.

The desktop contains various components, but at this point it’s enough to know that you are free to choose pretty much whichever desktop environment you want to use. Distributions such as Ubuntu, Mint, and OpenSUSE provide an array of different desktops that you can easily install. Ubuntu 11.10, for example, offers Unity, but you can easily install variants of Gnome. Another alternative is to use KDE in Ubuntu–either by downloading Kubuntu (a variation on the Ubuntu system that installs KDE as your default desktop) or by installing KDE in the standard version of Ubuntu.

The best choice for beginners is to stay with the default desktop environment for your distribution. But desktops in Linux are interchangeable; so as you become more comfortable using Linux, you can try out different desktops to see which one you like best.

Linux Kernel

The kernel – the software layer that acts as the go-between for your applications and your PC hardware – is the core of any Linux system. This is the component that you are least likely to have to deal with as part of maintaining your system, especially if you choose a beginner-friendly system such as Ubuntu or Mint. But as you delve into the Linux world, you’ll probably find people talking about the kernel on forums and help sites, so it’s helpful to know what the term refers to.

The stable version of the kernel at this writing is version 3.2.2. If you choose, you can update your kernel as new versions come out, but it’s much simpler to wait for your particular distribution to roll out kernel updates.

Time to try Linux
Now that you have a sense of how some of the Linux distributions differ, it’s time to try out a few and see what you think. Unlike with Windows, you don’t have to buy a CD or purchase an access code; instead, you can just hop online and download any distro you want to try, for free. And if you don’t have the bandwidth to download Linux, many distros will send you an installation CD by mail (usually for a nominal fee).

Many distros – including Debian, Fedora, OpenSUSE, Linux Mint, and Ubuntu – also offer downloadable live CDs. Live CDs let you run the operating system without installing it on your hard drive. That way you can get a better sense of what it will be like to use a particular distro. Live CDs tend to be less responsive (and to run slower) than the actual operating system. The main thing to focus on with live CDs is the look and feel of the interface and the way the system is organised.

To create a live CD you must download the OS and then create a disc image on a blank CD, external hard drive, or USB flash drive. If you’ve never copied or burned a bootable disc image, try Ubuntu first before moving on to other distros. Canonical has a convenient step-by-step online guide for downloading and creating an Ubuntu live CD using Windows or OS X.

Let’s get serious
Okay, you’ve tried out a bunch of live CDs, and now you’re ready to install Linux on your PC. Let’s assume that you’ve decided to go with Ubuntu and that you’re installing it on a Windows machine (yes, some people do install Linux on a Mac). If you are new to the Linux world and still rely on Windows for certain programs, or if you need to use Windows for your job, you can install Linux alongside Microsoft’s OS in a dual-boot configuration. This way, each time you boot up your system, you can choose to run either Windows or Linux.

Ubuntu comes with a handy feature called Wubi (Windows-based UBuntu Installer) that lets you access Ubuntu inside Windows as if it were an application. Like a live CD, Wubi may cause Ubuntu to run a little bit slower than it normally would, but it will give you the chance to acclimate to Linux if you aren’t willing to jump in right away.

Once you learn your way around the system, Linux is just as easy to use as Windows or Mac OS. But Linux differs from those systems, and consequently it takes some getting used to. For this reason, you may want to take your Linux transition slow.

The alternative is to adopt what my colleague Tony Bradley calls the scorched-earth option: Wipe out Windows and install your Linux distribution as the sole OS on your machine. This is the method I chose when I moved to Linux full-time, and I found that going this route was fairly easy. The only major drawback of this approach involves needing to run a piece of custom software built on Windows or OS X for your job. If that’s your situation, you should probably go with a dual-boot solution.

Creating a dual-boot environment doesn’t require much heavy lifting. Many Linux distributions provide step-by-step instructions for installing Linux on a Windows PC in a way that supports peaceful coexistence. Ubuntu offers dual-boot setup directions, as does OpenSUSE. Also, consult PCWorld’s “How (and Why) to Partition Your Hard Drive” for advice on how to lay the groundwork for creating a dual-boot PC.

The terminal (mostly optional)
You can spend your whole computing life inside Linux and rarely have to open a command line prompt to get things done. Nevertheless, learning at least a few basic operations can be helpful, though doing so is entirely optional.

Bash (Bourne again shell) is the standard command line interpreter for most Linux distributions (as well as for Mac OS X), and it’s a lot easier to use than you might think. Among the helpful commands that you may wish to learn are how to create empty files and directories (folders), how to search for and kill a running process on your system, how to view hidden directories, how to switch between directories, how to open files and applications, the ‘locate’ command, the ‘find’ command, and the ‘grep’ command. At some point you may also want to learn how to install an application from the command line; but with a system such as Mint or Ubuntu, that method should rarely be necessary.

You can find many novel uses for the command line, too. For instance, you can use Bash to run a text-only Twitter client called TTYtter, learn to use command-line text editors such as Vi or Emacs, try a simple to-do list program called Todo.txt, use Python as a handy calculator, browse the Web with the text-only browser Lynx, run system backups using Rsync, create text shortcuts (called aliases) for executing daily tasks, and automate tedious or repetitive tasks (such as backups) using Cron. All of these operations and programs are much simpler to use than you might think, and learning them will greatly enhance how you use your computer.

Even if you’re not interested in the command line, you may need to access the Terminal to deal with occasional (but increasingly rare) hardware problems such as adjusting a laggy mouse driver. Otherwise, you can live happily inside Linux without ever opening the Terminal program.

Ubuntu Software Center
If you decide to go with Ubuntu as your distribution, you’ll pick up most of your applications from the Ubuntu Software Center, an online store for downloading and installing applications and utilities. The Ubuntu Software Center began shipping with Ubuntu in 2009 and subsequent Ubuntu releases have included incremental improvements. The store currently offers numerous free software packages as well as some paid apps. Using the USC is as simple as searching for a program and clicking Install.

By default, Ubuntu comes with a lot of great software, including Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird (email client), the Libre Office suite, Gedit text editor, and GIMP. Those applications also come with many other Linux distributions; or you can install them after initial setup. You can get a lot of popular third-party software for Linux, just as you can for Windows and OS X; examples include Google’s Chrome browser, Skype, Spotify, and Scrivener – a popular word processor designed for professional writers. Much of this software, including Skype, Spotify, and Scrivener, tends to be marked “beta.” But don’t let that scare you off: All three work very well in Linux.

If you can’t find a Linux version of the software you need, you can try running Windows apps in WINE, a program designed to handle that task inside Linux. WINE may not be able to run every program you throw at it. But if you absolutely need a piece of Windows software, and no Linux alternatives are available, give WINE a try.

Finding help
If you run into problems while using Linux – whether hardware issues, software installation problems, or something else – you can turn to numerous online forums for help. Typically each distribution maintains its own forum where you can seek out assistance, and many third-party sites are full of solid advice, too.

The best way to find help is to start with a simple Web search for the problem you’re having. Searches often lead Ubuntu users to the official Ubuntu user forums, but Stack Exchange’s Ask Ubuntu is also a good source for information.

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When researching problems, you may find that the first few sites you visit may offer complex and over-the-top solutions that require 15 lines of code or mucking about with some file buried deep in your operating system. But chances are that any issues you come up against as a beginner will be comparatively trivial and easy to solve.

Consequently, the best way to research your problem is to assume that it can be solved with a few simple mouse clicks or less than one line of code entered at the command line. There are exceptions to that rule, of course; but if you begin by assuming that the answer to your problem is simple and exhaust all of the straightforward possibilities before moving on to far more complex solutions, you’ll save yourself a lot of time and hassle.

These basic tips should help you get started with Linux. So give a few live CDs a try, and see what you think. You’ll be surprised at just how useful a Linux system can be.

Source:http://howto.techworld.com/operating-systems/3334504/how-set-up-linux-on-your-computer/?intcmp=ros-md-hwt